Back to the Future

Marty McFly. Doc Brown. Biff. The Libyans and their plutonium. That crazy-doored DeLorean. And of course, the flux capacitor. Stuck in the 1950s, Marty, the epitome of the skateboarding American ’80s teen, must desperately try to get his square teenage parents to fall in love — and thus ensure his own being. Remember that photograph of the disappearing family members? It was a particularly clever example of the “grandfather paradox”: If Marty changed anything in the past, he and his siblings would be erased. Travel back to the prehistoric era, step on a bug, and humankind ceases to exist, that sort of thing.

Marty dodges his (future) mother’s advances and brings an electric “Johnny B. Goode” to the doo-wop crowd. When his guitar antics take on a little too much rock, he knows it: “I guess you guys aren’t ready for that yet. But your kids are gonna love it.” With the mad but lovable Doc (Christopher Lloyd) and the help of a lightning-struck clock tower, Marty eventually returns to 1985. Naturally, sequels followed the Robert Zemeckis–directed, Steven Spielberg–produced classic.